Microsoft Buys HockeyApp To Add Developer Tools To Its Mobile Effort

Apple has Test Flight, Twitter has Crashlytics, and now Microsoft has HockeyApp. The Windows Phone maker has made an acquisition to continue building out its mobile business, this time focusing on developers. HockeyApp is a suite of tools that includes live crash reports, user feedback tools, a beta distribution platform and test analysis that works across Windows Phone as well as Android and iOS.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed. It looks like the company’s founding team is coming over to Microsoft with the acquisition. “Our indie spirit will continue on at Microsoft and we’re more excited than ever about the future of HockeyApp,” the four founders Michael Simmons, Andreas Linde, Stefan Haubold, Thomas Dohmke write in a note on their site. The app is based out of Stuttgart, Germany.

On Microsoft’s blog, S. Somasegar — Microsoft’s VP of its developer division — notes that the company will integrate HockeyApp into the Application Insights service in Visual Studio Online “to expand Application Insights support for iOS and Android.” That will include new features coming soon, he notes.

Microsoft had been a HockeyApp customer prior to this. “We saw the potential of the added abilities and resources of Microsoft to make our platform even better. It may sound cliché, but it really does feel like a match made in heaven,” the founders write.

But — if Microsoft remains committed to supporting multiple platforms — it also points to how the company is setting its sights bigger than its own walled garden.

The company has been focusing on expanding its own apps to Android and iOS, and to continue to court developers to its platform, it needs to make it a place where they can test and develop more than just for Windows Phone.